


Pay Your Debts

by Red Dragon (Red_Dragonn)



Category: Original Work
Genre: Blood and Gore, Body Horror, Demon Deals, Demons, Demons Are Assholes, Eldritch, Gen, Mild Gore, Original work - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-03
Updated: 2017-10-03
Packaged: 2019-01-08 13:52:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12255696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Red_Dragonn/pseuds/Red%20Dragon
Summary: It’s always unwise to bargain with a demon queen, but it’s just plain stupid to leave your end of the deal unfulfilled...





	Pay Your Debts

The Faelin returned to the Delinmar Court exactly the second ten years had passed. Her bill had come due, and the Demon Queen would colllect that which was owed her. 

Of course, only the foolish dealt in gold, and only the foolish dealt with gods, and so King Torgirl was a fool twice over; and furthermore the King had failed to count the days and prepare for the Faelin's return, and only the utmost of fools would be content to lie complacent on the chopping block. 

She twisted into the weave of the fabric of the universe, strode through the spaces between the air and returned to reality in the center of King Torgirl's audience hall. No man, king or otherwise, greeted her. Gold, her metal, lay strewn about the room haphazardly, goblets and plates and decor; the guards lounged and drank themselves into a stupor in the hall. Where was her sacrifice? Where was the feast she had been sworn? 

Twisting back into the swiftly-moving empty gaps where the very atoms of the world couldn't touch her if they dared, the Faelin opened her second set of eyes, the demon set, and went looking for a missing monarch. 

Torgirl slumbered, repose undisturbed in his gaudy golden chambers as he neglected the terms of their contract. The Faelin found him easily, and closed her demon eyes once more--the dual sight always threw her off in the physical world--and curled her molecules back into a solid form. 

Perhaps this king was an idiot, but to sleep through the coming of a power as ancient and deadly and feared as she was...that was brazen, and frankly offensive. The Bloody One had not spent so long cultivating her reputation to be ignored by petty rulers of small human lands. 

" _Get up_ ," she murmured, vibrating power suffusing her words and making them a demand, not an option. The king startled awake, eyes flashing open as he was roused as rudely as she could manage from what had likely been a deep sleep. 

"Who goes there?" demanded King Torgirl, carefully trying to sound authoritative and failing utterly. "State your name." 

"Ah, come on," the Faelin muttered, opening her demon eyes just long enough to roll them dramatically without taking her eyes off of her prize. "It's not like me showing up is any kind of surprise." 

She could see the shock that lanced through the king's body from where she stood. 

" _You!_ " Torgirl snarled, bolting upright. "You dare come _here_?" 

The Faelin snorted inelegantly. "I walk through walls like they're made of water, and people as though they were air. I 'dare' go wherever I please," she asserted. "But _you_..." 

Here she paused, an idea striking her. 'Let's let the man simmer for a bit,' she thought. 

The king sighed. "You cannot be here. It is not...it should not be _possible_ ," King Torgirl insisted, still dazed. "I reinforced this building." 

Ah. Yes. The iron door. She'd noticed that; she's thought it was cute. 

"I did say i could walk through _walls_ , yeah?" she asked. "Because your walls aren't iron, and even if they were, I can go to wherever my metal is." 

‘Lets see if he realizes that I mean gold,' she mused. 'There is so much of it here that i mistook the room for the Royal Treasury.' 

As it was, the King opened and closed his mouth speechlessly for some time before it seemed to sink in that this was a legitimate threat. 

"If this is true, demoness, then you can find me wherever i am, whenever I am," King Torgirl said. "When I sleep, and when I wake. Am I _never_ free of your eye?" 

"Nope," said the Faelin. 

"Well," said the king. "Well, I...well...uh. I never." 

'Enough stewing. This is boring,' she thought. 

"I have a matter to bring up, now, concerning our little _deal_ ," she said sweetly. 

A hunted look crossed the ruler's face, before he swiftly affected an air of minor interest. "Ye-es?" 

"Where are my meals?" 

"That. Right. _Surely_ you can be a little lenient--" 

"No; you remember the terms, and you know what it means to fail to deliver. Now i will ask you only once more." 

The King gulped. 

" _Where, is, my, feast_?" the Faelin pressed. "If i need to spell it out for you, you swore me the lives of your youngest sibling and oldest child. I waited ten long years for this." 

Torgirl made a noise somewhere between a sob and a choked sigh. 

"I don't have a child," the king said desperately. "But with a little more time, maybe..." 

The Faelin tried not to scoff as the king got onto the floor and kneeled before her.

"Just give me one more year, I swear--" 

"It's been _ten_ years since I delivered that ultimatum!" the Faelin finally raised her voice, allowing the deep undertones to rattle in the stone floors and shake the king to his bones. “I was promised one life for each year, and those I received, but also the child and the sibling on the tenth, and neither found neither here waiting for me.” 

“I just—“ stammered Torgirl. 

“You just nothing. We were clear on the terms, King. Did i not warn you?” 

“I need more _time_ ,” the king pleaded desperately, 

“You need _nothing_ ,” said the Faelin. “You _should_ have paid me, but you didn't, and that means that all you 'need' is to stop breathing. .” 

She smirked as he scrambled for the door, running rapid-fire for someplace down the hall. It had been a while since she’d had a good chase, and she set off at a slow, simple pace as she doggedly walked the path that Torgirl was sprinting. 

Her prey wearing a gold chain, and gold bracers, and she could always feel where her metal was. 

She twisted into the slip-world and opened her demon set of eyes, gliding through walls and floors like they were water, and stepped behind Torgirl before curling herself back to the real world. 

“Boo.” 

Torgirl went bone-pale, stiff and silent with utter terror, whirling to face the monster behind him. “How—“ 

“Does it matter?” she asked, reaching out gently to take hold of his hand and grab at the royal seal on his hand. She slid it off his finger carefully. It was old, and delicate, and she had wanted it for a long time. 

She dropped the king’s hand — 

“You’re letting me _go_?” breathed Torgirl incredulously— 

and reached out with her empty hand, already flattened and twisted into intangibility, into the rib cage of the king. She felt about with her fingers for a second, and then wrenched the molecules of her arm back into place. 

King Torgirl screamed in agony as the bones in his ribs and sternum exploded to make room for the Faelin’s suddenly-solid arm inserted halfway through them. One of his lungs developed a thumb-shaped hole and started to collapse, and his heart stuttered to a halt as a clawed blue hand curled around the tough bottom portion and yanked it from its veined seat. 

She raised the morsel of meat to her lips and smiled sharply at the dying king. 

“You should have paid me,” she said, and bit down.

**Author's Note:**

> This is for a creative writing group i’m in in my school, so any and all criticisms are welcome and highly appreciated.


End file.
